Workplace Diversity Issues and Concerns

Chapter 10 Essay

In my opinion, some of the companies having in place impressive diversity programs are inclusive of; Cisco Systems and Mattel. With regard to Cisco Systems, the company has managed to rope in its employees into the diversity discourse via what is refers to as Global Diversity Inclusion and Diversity Council. It would be prudent to note that as Aperian Global (2021) points out, “full engagement of teams at all levels of an organization has the potential to bring real changes, both to workplace culture and to the company’s success.” On the other hand, Mattel also engages teams at various organizational levels – in what effectively enables the company to gather new insights about the best way to implement some organizational initiatives.

There are certain aspects of corporate training that are not working. For instance such training efforts fail to take into consideration certain other features of diversity and instead focus on the basic aspects of diversity, i.e. diversity based on the basis of gender and race. Other features of diversity that also ought to be considered in such efforts are inclusive of, but they are not limited to, sexual orientation, etc. Next, some research studies have indicated that the move by some firms to implement mandatory diversity training efforts could do more harm than good. This is more so the case given that mandatory initiatives may not garner the genuine support of management. Towards this end, Kalev (as cited in Aperian Global, 2021) is categorical that voluntary programs are more effective.